The Last Sacrifice
by Herraidous
Summary: Sacrifices arc spin-off. An instant's realisation changes everything.


Disclaimer:  
The full Sacrifices arc is written by the amazing Lightning on the Wave. She came up with this brilliant universe, and I'm just writing a short, tragic, alternate ending to her awesome series.  
It's just an idea I had, that struck suddenly. The first bit is copied directly from I Am Also Thy Brother, but those who have read the Sacrifices arc should know where this diverges. Again, I don't own this series. I make no claim to it.  
Nor do I own Harry Potter, never have, never will.

The Last Sacrifice:  
Harry was indeed glad that he'd brought the healing potions when he saw his brother. Connor lay on the dirt without a chain or rope-speaking further to Voldemort's scornful confidence, that Harry would never destroy his brother-but he had fingers still badly broken and harshly reset, and his limbs twitched in small, regular convulsions. Harry knelt down beside him, dropped the Extabesco plene, and smoothed a hand over his brow, over the scar that concealed the Horcrux. Connor shivered and opened his eyes.  
The tears in his eyes said clearly that he thought he was seeing a dream. "Harry?" he whispered.  
"Here, brother." Harry had never known that his own voice could sound so calm, so steady. He tipped a few of the healing potions down Connor's throat, until his breathing eased and he could sit up. Connor leaned against the dirt wall. Harry put the rest of the healing potions carefully within his reach, and then drew out the Switching Potion. The red line in the middle separated half from half, and he nodded and uncorked the vial.  
"Harry?" Connor whispered. "What are you doing?"Harry ignored him for the moment. Now was not the time to let Connor talk him out of anything. He would explain once he was done, because his twin deserved to hear it, but not before.  
He drank half of the potion, down to the red line.  
The effect was immediate, though very odd-not at all like the other times he had used it. Then again, he'd never been the one to whom the dreams or knowledge was transferred. He felt another tunnel open across his brow, this one connecting his scar to Connor's, and a mighty yank made his head bob forward. Then his mind filled with the heavy sense that he could compel people if he wanted to. Harry let out a slow breath. That, of course, was not a true compulsion gift, but just the form that this shard of Tom Riddle's soul had taken.  
"Harry?" Connor repeated, insistently.  
Harry looked up at him, and smiled as gently as he could under the circumstances. He had the feeling that it was more exhausted than tender. "You were a Horcrux, Connor," he said quietly.  
"That's why I couldn't kill Voldemort, why he prevented his Death Eaters from killing you, and why he took you. It happened that night he came hunting us in Godric's Hollow. A shard of soul became embedded in you."  
Connor stared at him with an open mouth, then whispered, "How?"  
Harry shrugged. His head really did feel heavier. "Ask the prophecy. Ask the odd combination of magic going on in the room that night. My guess is that the Killing Curse he cast at you, and which got interrupted by my rebounded one, split his soul again, using him as both the murder victim and the source of the shard, and then the shard took the only available path it could and flew into you."  
Connor swallowed several times, then said, "But that means-that means-" He stopped.  
"It did," Harry corrected him, taking pity. He would not make Connor say that he would have to die for the safety of the world.  
"I used the Switching Potion to transfer the Horcrux into myself."  
More silence. Harry thought it had been perhaps two minutes since he took the Potion now.  
"Why?" Connor said, both a demand and a rebuke at once.  
"Because I'm so damn tired of sacrifices." Harry yawned. He would wait just a few more minutes, to say farewell to his twin and make sure that he understood the truth and what he needed to do, and then he would kill himself. He was looking forward to the sleep that awaited him. Perhaps there would be sounds of the sea, or beloved voices, but he would prefer soundless oblivion.  
"I couldn't bear to see you die. Voldemort knows it. Even if I could bear to stand by and watch, say, Peter sacrifice himself to break the Unassailable Curse on you, we would still have to destroy your body to get the shard out so I could swallow it. I couldn't kill you. But I can, quite willingly and happily, die. That will be the willing sacrifice that breaks the Curse, and the one that destroys the body so that the shard will have to flee."  
"And what if the shard just possesses me?" Connor demanded tensely. "I was its home for seventeen years." He shuddered as if he had swallowed something foul-tasting.  
Harry laughed softly. "That won't happen, Connor. When I die, my magic is going to snap right back to Voldemort. The shard will go with it, I think, drawn along by the sheer pull. Then Voldemort will have two pieces of his soul in the same body again, but no more Horcruxes. He can be killed.' He lifted his head. The air was filling with sweet thunder. "The prophecy will insure it," he added. "You're the younger now, Connor, and you can kill Voldemort just like I could have. He's a powerful wizard, but he'll be mortal in a few moments. A successful Killing Curse will slay him just like anyone else."  
The prophecy, somewhat to Harry's surprise, didn't continue congealing. It hung in the air like a miasma instead, as if waiting for something. Harry frowned at a corner where it seemed strongest, wondering what it wanted.  
"You think," Connor said, voice like a whiplash. "What premise is that to hang the safety of the world on, Harry?"  
"When otherwise we would have no chance at all? A very good one." Harry started to lie down.  
"What about everyone who needs you?" Connor demanded. "The magical creatures? Draco? Snape? Me?"  
"I've done what I can for them," said Harry, and lowered his head to rest on his hands. "Now I've run up against something I can't do. It's just like asking me to kill Draco to save the world. I can't change what I am. But I can do this, Connor." He sighed. His eyes wanted to droop shut, but he had a few more things to say first. "I will miss you. But I can't go on now. I've finally learned to be human, just like the prophecy said."  
Prophecies, inevitably, run out, sang the line in his mind.  
Connor was staring at him. His chest heaved as if he were struggling for air, but no sound escaped his mouth. His eyes were bright and very hollow.  
"Snape, Peter, and Draco are trapped behind a wall down the corridor that only a Light wizard can break," Harry said. "Your wand is in my robe pocket. I-"  
Connor lunged.  
Harry reared backwards instinctively, but it wasn't him Connor was going for.  
No.  
It was the switching potion.  
No-  
No!  
And Harry, his magic howling, reacted the only way he could.  
Time seemed to slow. Connor's lunge seemed almost sluggish. And Harry, reacting to the desperation and pain he bore, sent a blast of magic at Connor in the shape of the stunning spell, so common and passive and yet exactly what he needed, something that would not hurt his brother, and yet something that would ensure he could not interfere with Harry's plan.  
And then Harry came to a realization: Connor wouldn't have to kill Voldemort after all. He could do it himself, in his final moments. And he wouldn't risk his brother's life in a final confrontation with Riddle.  
His smile, like the one he'd worn when he first came up with the idea of his suicidal sacrifice, held no joy.  
You must not die, brother.  
Farewell.  
No more sacrifices.  
"Farewell, brother." His voice choked on the last words, his emotion presenting itself through his voice, no cages, no suppression.  
Not this time.  
No more sacrifices.  
As Connor collapsed mid-lunge, Harry focused his magic, an outlet for his pain, the pain of watching Connor's torture, the pain of his helplessness, the pain of the sheer amount of lives lost all because of a madman's delusions.  
"Avada Kedavra."  
As the green light struck, Harry channeled his magic down the tunnel connecting him and Voldemort, and, though he had not known it, until recently, Connor. He focused it into an arrowhead, at the same time as he unleashed his Dark rage, the force of will that wanted nothing so much as to crush, to kill, to dominate. The same force that he'd unleashed when Voldemort had sent Sylvan and Oaken to kill Medusa and Eos.  
Because, at the end of all things, prophecies, after all, ran out.  
And he considered himself human, now.  
He had made himself human past the doubt.  
He knew that his willing sacrifice would shatter the Unassailable curse upon the Horcrux and blast it back to Voldemort, and would also destroy him, with the Dark Fury he had unleashed upon him, combined with the momentum of the killing curse and the willing sacrifice.  
Willing sacrifices.  
No more sacrifices.  
And as the green light struck, took him from life, he had time for one last thought. I am a son, and a lover. But I am also thy brother, Connor. I am also thy brother.

The End 


End file.
